christopher N.
Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States
About christopher N.
76 years old
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Retired business owner
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As a couple/duo
We are Christopher Nater and Kelli Prine, a married couple (33 years) who love France and have a life-long love of cats. First, the France part: 17 years ago Kelli spent a year by herself at university in Lyon and fell in love with France. Ten months into her stay, she announced she wanted to spend the last 2 months touring France; Christopher responded by buying a vintage small motor home (or “camping car” as you say in France) in California, remodeling it at our home in Albuquerque, New Mexico, driving it to the east coast of the United States and eventually shipping it by boat to Zeebrugge. Seven weeks later, Christopher flew to Belgium, retrieved the motor home and drove to Lyon to surprise Kelli with our “Petit Chateau Qui Roule” which became our miniature vacation home for the next 2 months. We had such a great time, we decided to store the motor home at a campground in the Loire Valley called Le Serpolin in Cléré-Sur-Layon. You may call the campground owners, Matthew and Donna-Marie Goddard +332 41 03 22 72 for a reference on us. In the ensuing 17 years, missing only a few times, we’ve hired cat-and-house sitters for our own home in Albuquerque, flown to France each summer, dusted off the motor home, chased out the field mice and camped our way around France for 7 or 8 weeks. What a way to travel! Now that we are both retired, we try to spend 6 months in France every year. In 2022 we discovered house sitting (through Nomador and TrustedHouseSitters.com) and our first year were accepted for a total of SIX house sits (5 in France and 1 in London), all concluded wonderfully. So wonderfully that every host family asked us to come back and sit for them again in 2024. In fact I’m writing this profile from a house sit in Lyon. Kelli and I are both retired with extensive experience with cats (2 spoiled Siamese twin sisters named Coco and Chanel.) We are experienced home owners; we own four houses in Albuquerque (live in one, rent the other 3) so we know what it means to properly care for a house. Christopher is handy with tools and enjoys gardening. Kelli enjoys watching him and loving on the cats.
My travel companions
Kelli Prine, 70 years old, Retired maths teacher, Spouse / Partner
Language(s) spoken
English
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French
Compliments received
Community opinion
Strasbourg, France - September 2024
Excellent homesitteurs ! Christopher et Kelli ont pris soin de mon appartement, de mes plantes et de mon chat, avec qui ils ont essayé par tous les moyens de créer une relation 🙂 Une très bonne communication avant et pendant leur séjour chez moi. Christopher m'a donné des nouvelles régulièrement et toujours avec une touche d'humour. Christopher et Kelli sont des personnes de confiance, je les recommande à 100%% !
Lyon, France - October 2022
Kelly and Christopher were really good home-sitter ! We had the chance to meet them, before we left, to get to know each other and meet the cats. We had frequent news during our holidays (with a good sense of humour :)). Ours cats seemed to enjoy Christopher's company. The flat was very clean when we returned and we are looking forward to see them again when they'll be back in Lyon !
Lyon, France - August 2022
Très belle rencontre avec Chris et Kelly . Nous avons passé une belle soirée de découverte en amont du house sitting. Chris nous a donné régulièrement des nouvelles avec un tel humour que nous aurions aimé en avoir encore plus souvent tellement nous riions à chaque fois ! Notre chat a été ultra satisfait des câlins ; et le tortue a mentionné également les avoir appréciés ! Bref tout le monde était ravi et nous comptons bien les revoir chez nous comme house sitters ou comme hôtes !